Cameron’s crisis management has established a special unit to prepare for a hung parliament. It is something that should not be in the newspapers.
A shadow cabinet minister comments:
What's going wrong with our campaign? Are we just making the odd mistake, or is there a deeper problem?
The answer to the first question is here.
The answer to the second question is yes and yes. The deeper problem is the Tory party that will be on display in Brighton this weekend. It hasn't fundamentally changed.
Just what did happen to that Clause IV moment?
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They're lumbering from one disaster to another and just don't see it.
ReplyDeleteBrown & Co must be laughing into their Blackberrys.
Indeed. Just what will Brown do on Monday if the polls narrow further over the weekend?
ReplyDeleteI really can't see anything in this news article that justifies the headline. At the most, it would appear to support a statement along the lines of 'considers the possibility of a hung Parliament'. Which is merely realistic.
ReplyDeleteOn the plus side, the Tory slogan 'Vote for Change' is refreshing. The greater danger from all this is knee-jerk reaction to the vagaries of polling and minor shifts in public opinion, rather than taking the broad measure of polling and demonstrating leadership on the key issues. For most people, PMQs are irrelevant, GDP growth is irrelevant, what they relate to is what is in their pocket at the end of the month and what annoys them during the intervening four weeks.
Team Cameron had the 'sweet spot' before Christmas and need to rediscover it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_spot
Times has an interesting article on GDP growth for 2010Q1. It bears out the theory that a higher 2009Q4 figure is not necessarily a good thing.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article7043268.ece
GDP growth fluctuates anyway during any year, we understand why growth would be sluggish in Q1 anyway, and normally this is not an issue...unless you are looking for a growth trend and end up disappointed.
This also illustrates the principle that today's spending (and today's growth) is storing up problems for the future, as long as the deficit remains unaddressed.
Alastair Darling (who has risen in my estimation as one of the few Labour figures with some vestige of integrity) could argue that the 2010Q1 figure may end up being revised upwards to get him off the hook....although they didn't argue that for the last figures!
I think it is more appropriate to focus on productivity than GDP but that is just my view! UK tends to lag behind.
"It hasn't fundamentally changed."
ReplyDeleteWrong: it's not fundamentally different from New Labour.
Jess, It is impossible to say this far out what the Q1 figures will be. This is all guess work to fill a newspaper.
ReplyDeleteWhat I have blogged about this morning is that Osborne's budget has leaked, which is not a wise decision, as Brown will just use the policies himself.